The Community Gardener's Journal

Community Garden Journal—5/30/08


If you can fall in love with a garden, then I'm in love. Six o'clock on Friday evening, I drove up to the community garden site—a fenced rectangle atop a grassy bank up the street from Riverside School. In the car, a couple of flats and a child's rake, a trowel, a bag of rock phosphate and a bag of Plant Grow (or something equally direct).

With map in hand, I clambered up the embankment to the promised land. Yes, a fenced garden, the plots laid out in neat rectangles, marked by taut white string. The map I held had the names of the other gardeners and I knew most of them. Indeed, my neighbor across the street, Neil Drake, was happily, and quite professionally, laying out his Rayme cloth and putting in the last tomato. Neil, it turns out, is a veteran of Oneonta's community gardens and immediately pronounced this one (as opposed to the one beyond the waste treatment plant) superior.

I should mention that I've never vegetable-gardened before. In fact, I am an inheritor of gardens, flower gardens, which I tend sporadically while deriving great enjoyment from whatever has the nerve to bloom, given my lack of ministrations.

For my community plot, I have a new resolve. First, I spotted the notice in the Daily Star and was the first to call and pick a plot. For some of you "early birders," this would be nothing. For me, it is the first time I've ever been the first to arrive anywhere for anything. Imagine, Steve Andrews, the Recreation Department Director who oversees the project, handing me the blank map of the garden and saying, "Pick any plot. You're the first."

I picked the plot closest to the water source.

But by the time I received the final map, I'd been bumped over one and the water had been bumped over five. The best laid plans…No matter. The water source turns out to be a large galvanized tub. No hose. Someone had thoughtfully left a large plastic jug. I forgot a watering can. My plan this Friday afternoon was to get those babies (and I mean babies, we'll get to that later) into the earth and let the predicted showers take care of the rest.

I am writing this around 11:00 p.m. on Friday. It still has not rained. If it is not raining tomorrow morning, I will go out to the garden before we leave for the weekend to water the plants.






#2

Soil. Earth. Okay, one reason I've never taken up vegetable gardening is because of the soil. I am terrified of it. The stuff I have in my backyard is rocky, root-crossed, laced with shards of glass--extremely urban. It takes a lot of time just to dig a small hole. So when I read that the community garden would already be tilled and fertilized, I thought to myself—a dream comes true: Insta-garden. Easy gardening. The soil is taken care of.

Not so fast.

The weekend before digging in my trowel, my family and I drove up to Downeast Maine to visit a friend who is a serious (and professional) organic gardener. My thought was to follow Sue around with a note book, taking notes (obviously) and learning all there is to know about organic farming in a short weekend. I also had arranged to buy seedlings started in her greenhouse.

Reality: after about half an hour of note-taking, Sue put down her trowel and suggested I buy a really good book on organic farming. She recommended "The Garden Primer" by Barbara Damrosch—a fellow Maine organic gardener who is considered one of the most knowledgeable vegetable gardeners in the country. I took the hint and bought a copy in Ellsworth.

We left Maine, however, with a rear seat full of seedlings: sun gold cherry tomatoes; broccoli king broccoli (broccoli royalty); sweet cabbage; butter crunch lettuce; Greek oregano—and an array of flowers—delphinium; crazy daisy; yarrow; snapdragons. My vision is to create a French kitchen garden, planted with vegetables and edible flowers—marigolds, nasturtium, violets, pansies and herbs. I'd like to embed creeping lemon thyme in the paths so when I walk along the beds, I release the aroma of lemon zest. I want to make tepees out of stripped branches and let beans spiral up along them entwined with morning glories and clematis.

I realize that I want to make my garden a small work of art. A garden plot is the perfect project for a novelist between books. I fall in love with the 10' x 20' plot as though it was the blank page, the empty structure on which to construct a new vision.


#3—Cool Neighborly Stuff

Well for one thing when you've lived in a small town for almost 15 years you have the illusion that you know everyone. Not true, of course. But looking at the map of plots, now named, I see that I know more than half of the 16 gardeners. This seems fun, exciting—a way of meeting people in a different context—not the elementary school corridor or Italian Kitchen. And sure enough, each plot reveals the gardener's personality. I'm not completely sure, but at first glance at the plot that's been transformed into a large diamond with triangle raised beds, my thought is: Jennie Williams! Has to be. She would transform the space that way. And there is practical Neil with his Wal-Mart plastic and his vow just to plant his tomatoes, let the rain take care of the watering.

My neighbor to the right I haven't met, but his (or her) plot has interesting circles, a plant apiece, and plastic buckets and a watering can that I borrow without permission, assuming that all us gardeners are in this together. Another plot has neatly staked tomatoes, but quite a different look than Neil's. Delicate, unmulched. Beside it someone has mulched with grass clippings. The other plots are unworked so far. Again I'm in the unusual position (for me) of early bird or go-getter.

The sky is growing darker; a few light spits of rain. I cast my rock phosphate over the entire plot, followed by the Plant Grow. I grab the kid's rake and start digging away. The idea is to work the nutrients into the top 4 or 5 inches of soil. I wanted to get a soil test done before planting anything (Sue's recommendation), and I wanted to get a load of aged manure from Quality Stable, but I'm too impatient and figure I can't afford to miss the free watering from the sky.

In go the tomatoes, the broccoli, the cabbage, the cucumber, the basil, the butter crunch lettuce. In the corners I place marigolds—supposed to keep insects away.

In another bed, I put in the delphinium, and the snapdragons, the daisies, and the yarrow, and a beautiful vine with pink, tropical-looking flowers called, "Clarkia" (one of Sue's seedlings). It's going on 7:00 p.m. The kids are at home, unfed. The sky is still low, but the sprinkling has stopped. The garden is in. The garden, so far. Still to go—potatoes, onions, chard, pole beans. I'd love to do peas, but Sue tells me it's too late. I think I'll try it anyhow. The soil is so easy to work; the light, so good.


#4

Okay. What I am going to reveal here is going to cause some readers to howl and others to snap the paper shut in disgust. What you are going to learn about this gardener's level of ignorance will either make you feel as though you have found a shoulder to cry on or prompt a letter to the editor—take her off this beat. But I remind you, dear reader, I am a NOVICE gardener. I am a beginner and I possess a beginner's mind.

I bought lettuce plants today. Bibb and butter crunch and then I broke down and bought a nifty, six-plant container of assorted colors of lettuce. Here's the problem. Is each one a head of lettuce? Or am I supposed to pluck the leaves I need for the night's salad and let the rest grow? Or, if I separate the head from its base will the head regrow like snakes from Medusa's brow? I am going to try to answer this question by the end of this column, if not by the next paragraph. I figure I have recourse to resources—sort of like the adult facing the kids on "Are You Smarter than a Fifth Grader?" I can a) call my friend, Sue, who will probably not laugh at me, that's not her style 2) I can consult The Garden Primer by Sue's friend, Barbara Damrosch and thereby not expose myself to the possibility of ridicule 3) I can find someone local (say another community gardener) and try to ask this question in some sort of unobtrusive manner. The last, clearly, is the riskiest. Though I know and respect several of my fellow gardeners, we are still at an acquaintance-level of friendship, and I feel in my gut that certain boundaries (beside the string ones) should be observed. Though I did not have to fill out a gardening questionnaire to participate in the community garden, I still feel a certain obligation to appear to know what I'm doing. One cannot garden on pure enthusiasm alone, can one? Well, actually, that's exactly what I'm doing.

This paragraph is treading water. I haven't gotten to The Primer yet—I have to find my reading glasses. So I'll hop over to another garden-related topic (much like moving from one bed to another): buying plants.

I thought because I am now a full-fledged community gardener that I should spread the wealth when it comes to purchasing plants. I've been good to my word. I started out at Asbury Gardens—where I found very friendly help and a veritable thumbs' up from the woman behind the counter. Only later did I learn that if I had bragged aloud at my Community Gardening status, I might have snagged a $10 gift certificate. The members of the Garden who attended the organizational meeting on the Saturday that I was away all did. Thanks, Asbury!

Next I went to Annutto's and scooped up that lettuce and a single Italian eggplant and a summer squash and a zucchini. One of each. I have been warned that entertaining a zucchini in your garden is like inviting carpenter ants to a picnic in your backyard. At your peril. I figure one zucchini, one yellow squash—pick them before they become gargantuan. But my real fear is that I will be the only gardener in the world who can't grow a zucchini. Not one.

Okay, I know you're wondering—did she go to Wal-Mart? In the spirit of complete disclosure and to prove I have nothing to hide other than my ignorance about planting lettuce—I did. I bought tiny geraniums for one dollar apiece. I bought even tinier dianthus (that cinnamon-smelling flower that looks like a small carnation) for fifty cents' apiece. I bought some of the mulch cloth that Neil recommended, though I did not find it aesthetically pleasing. I bought a long-handled shovel. Oh yes, and I found the only sweet potato plant in the metropolitan area. Hmm, I thought to myself, I wonder if I'm being taken? Why wouldn't you grow sweet potato from a seed potato the way you do regular potatoes? This is another one for Sue or The Primer or a yet-to-be-discovered life line. Stay tuned.

#5

I found out about the lettuce. Sue e-mailed me promptly: [use actual words]. So it seems we can have the best of both worlds when it comes to harvesting lettuce.

Oh, and the sweet potato plant. Sue had never heard of such a thing. "Go ahead and plant it," she wrote. I will. Did I mention I have six of them?




#6

Bit of a bummer of a gardening day. I made the mistake of opening The Garden Primer and looking up my vegetables. Of course this is the first thing I should have done, but I didn't. I've always been bad at reading instructions and following them. I enjoy winging it; rarely regret it.

Well, opening to Tomatoes, I find out that I should, of course, have added my aged manure before planting. I should have added a cup of manure to each hole. I should probably have "hilled up the dirt" to warm the soil for those heat-loving tomatoes. Shoulda coulda woulda. On top of all this, I should have had my soil tested! I knew this but it was going to take too long.

Sitting on the little wooden bench I dragged up to my plot, I looked up every vegetable that I've planted or plan to plant. According to the Primer, every step of the way I've skipped a few steps. With every vegetable comes a list of common pests and diseases. I wonder if there is such a thing as a "vegetable hypochondriac." I don't tend towards hypochondrical thinking for my own personal body, but I can see that I could become quite stressed over imagined diseases taking over my plants. Now all of a sudden, I notice that the cucumber's thick, succulent stem is starting to crack; the eggplant's leaves have tiny insects on them that look like brownish gray barnacles fashioned from fingernails. Slightly translucent and ridged. Absolutely horrifying. I flick them off instantly with a mother's instinct for protecting her young. Then I shudder: Holes where those barnacles sucked the leaf.

I think next year's Community Garden budget should include a line item for a resident plant doctor—or a master gardener who can set up a booth in one corner like Lucy and charge 5 cents or whatever the going rate is for advice--what are these strange insects on my tender Italian eggplant leaves? Why is my cucumber cracking and can I heal it?

I call Asbury Gardens to find out about a soil test. It turns out there's a long waiting list—eight samples ahead of me. This wasn't mentioned on that first heady visit to the Gardens when the woman behind the counter merely mentioned that the kits weren't in yet. I wish she'd told me that even when the kits arrived, I could plan on waiting my turn.

#7

I've decided I need to take responsibility for the "Community" part of the Community Gardening experiment. I'm going to buy a dry erase board and some markers and hang the board on the fence. Then we gardeners can communicate with each other. I am going to leave a note: I have five extra sweet potato plants. Anyone want them? I am going to query my fellow gardeners: does anyone know what the heck those strange-looking insects that hang out on eggplant leaves are? (I may have to glue one to the board to show them what I'm talking about.)


#8

Next year for the communal compost; the communal manure heap; the picnic table; the August potluck. But wouldn't it be cool to have a city-wide compost-maker? From all over the city they come, bearing scraps of vegetables, eggshells, and coffee grounds. From all over the city they come to shovel nutrient-rich dirt into their compostable paper bags. It's a vision, all right.

#9

The Community Garden is finally feeling like a community. Today I met "Tony" and "Kate." Tony came wheeling up on a yellow bicycle. He was wearing a tan painter's cap, a worn t-shirt whose insignia I couldn't make out and jeans. He had a long pony-tail and ruddy face and a mouth with a strangely shape upper lip, very slightly up-turned and smooth.

"Are you a fellow gardener?" I asked.
He nodded and came over to shake hands. "Plot 6," he said which surprised me because I had noticed a Tony on the garden map and thought there was only one, the Tony to the right of me with the strange circles, now amended by two golf balls.

He must have seen that I didn't quite believe him, because he gestured down the row, "That's me."

"Tomatoes," I said.

"Peppers," he corrected. "Lots of them."

We chatted some more and I immediately owned up to being a novice, if not a down right beginner.

"Oh," he said. "Well it looks good." He then proceeded to tell me how he used to plant a ten-acre plot in Delhi when he was a boy. His father took him to buy the land and he planted vegetables, a thousand dollars' worth. Made eight thousand on them in one summer. He was twelve years old.

"Wow," I said. What else could I say? Then I mentioned that I was going to try peas even though it's late and he said he was putting them in too. And he looked over at my stakes and admired my deer fence webbing that I'm planning to use as a pea trellis and asked where I found it. I was happy to plug Lowe's, my new favorite box store because they actually had a soil testing kit and they were so polite and helpful.

Tony glanced again at my invisible pea fence and said, "Be sure to plant on the far side, so the sun hits them first thing."

I thanked him and said please feel free to use my watering can and any equipment I leave behind. He appreciated that. He lives in the neighborhood and had to lug his own water the other day. He also identified the mysterious, leaf-sucking barnacle as a cut-worm. Will have to check this as this predator did not such much cut as suck, I thought.

#10

Hollie and I played mad scientist today. It was all I hoped it would be. I didn't think I could manage the soil test kit all by myself and Hollie has been dying to learn some gardening—from me! Hollie is a lawyer and the soil test kit came with a lot of instructions, so I knew she'd be the right person for the job.

I had started the process a few days before by collecting pinches of dirt from the four corners of my plot, so to speak. These samples were mixed together in a plastic cup and allowed to dry out in the kitchen.

Now for the hard part. Hollie settled in a chair in my backyard to pour over our soil testing instructions. "You need a piece of paper."

I ran inside for the leftover cardstock from Sarah's state project for Mr. Collier's class. "Now you need water, preferably distilled—"
"Don't have distilled."
"Okay, not distilled, and a measuring spoon and a plastic spoon."
By lovely coincidence I found the free plastic spoon that came in the Honey Nut Cheerios—a tiny yellow plastic cereal spoon with a friendly-looking bee sitting on the handle.
"Here's the garden spoon."
Hollie nodded brusquely. The lawyer clearly in ascendance. "Okay, so you're going to fill the yellow-capped test tube up to the line and add a PH tablet and let it sit for a minute. Do you have a timer?"
"I have a watch with a second hand."
"That'll have to do."
Two minutes later the test tube water has turned a pale green, something between sage and limeade. We hold the tube up to the color chart. The pretty squares each represent a level of pH—the most important number to determine whether you can grow anything in your soil. The ideal is a pH between 6.0 and 7.0, Sue had told me.

"I haven't been as nervous about a test since the blue line," I said at an attempt at levity.

Hollie remained grim. "Green," she said. "Definitely green."

We scan the chart. Pale green. pH 7.0! I do a victory dance with our pale green test tube. Perfect pH. We hit the jackpot; we're rich! At least we can't fail.
#11

Thank god for peas. They rescued me today. I have been feeling quite blue (and I'm not referring to a shade on the phosphorus chart), although maybe that's it—I need some minerals applied or some top-dressing with nutrient-rich compost. But in truth, I feel as though I have been top-dressed with manure—well-aged, of course. My novel continues to be rejected—even by an editor who loved my first book. I made the mistake of raising my expectations and made the logical conclusion, if she loved the first, she has to love the second. No logic in publishing—or in human nature.

But nature. That brings me back to the garden. And the peas. In my funk, one thought registered over and over: you've got to plant the peas. I was already aware that it's "too late" to plant peas. It's been 90 degrees every day for the past two weeks. The soil has probably warmed past the optimal temperature for cool-weather-loving peas. But the old salt, Tony, had recommended going ahead with pea-planting. "So it will take a little longer," he said. "So what."

I hauled myself to the garden, and as always, my mood lifted. First with the discovery that Jennie Williams, the artist gardener and true spirit of community, had tied a large chalk board to the fence. On it, she'd written: "This is our community blackboard. Steve says the water will be refilled this week—and we're getting a second tub, but not a hose." Off in the lower corner, she added: "This garden rocks!"

Three cheers for Jennie. Her blast of enthusiasm cheered me up. I turned to my garden and there was the sight of new growth. Yes, the cabbages are throwing up lots of beautiful cabbage-green leaves and the butter crunch heads are looking almost ready to sever. The basil is doing its basil thing and more of the little green marbles that are going to be Sun Gold tomatoes are appearing. The delphiniums are forming blooms, as are the snapdragons. It almost seems as though the garden is ahead of schedule—I almost want to shout: "Slow down."

On closer inspection, even the cucumber with the cracked stem is blooming with apricot-orange flowers, though the stem still looks as though it needs sutures. The beans that Hollie and I planted last week have not pierced the crust of earth, though, and the peppers, still upright, are dwarf-like.

That's okay. Above, the sky is turning a dark velvety gray, the wind is picking up, and I entertain the notion that getting struck by lightening in one's community garden plot would not be a bad way to go. I quickly dig a trench, four inches deep, in which to place the peas. I am guided by a) the Garden Primer and b) the stakes I put in on which to erect a pea trellis. The trowel digs in easily and once again I am thrilled with my already-tilled gift from the city. I place each pea along the bottom of the trench. Thunder rolls and a minute jagged dagger of lightening flashes in the still distant cloud. I pick up the pace, though, dig , dig, place, then pat the soil back over the trench. They call the garden plot a "bed" and it feels as though I am putting my peas to bed, tucking them in, laying a blanket of enriched dirt over their soon to be waking bodies.

The Primer says to water immediately, but I am going to trust God to do that. I pack up my trowel, my tool caddy. I'd like to leave some sort of message on the board, but I know it will be washed away. Leaving the garden, I'm feeling much better.

#12

Blissful evening. Jump on my bike and ride down to the garden to pick a head of lettuce and a bunch of basil and oregano for dinner. Seven thirty only five days past the solstice, so the light is like a great big unending note sung by a mezzo, dusky, rose-colored, scented with cinnamon and the light metal tang of humid earth. Ah how I enjoy the long glide down East Street, the hanging right onto Spruce, the clean left onto Ford. All over town people are starting their evening parties—the Millers are entertaining on the wrap around porch, clink of glasses and yes, tinkling laughter and college boys dressed up as waiters in white shirts and black slacks. I recognize the Vice President of the College's back, in a blink as I ride by, I catch summer green skirts and clean khaki pants, oxford blue shirts. Clink clink, ring, ring. But I feel free of all that, as I head toward Main Street, blocked off for an antique car show. Sparse crowd, elderly folk and grandchildren; half-way house people listing on tired pins; the announcer built-solid, a true block of a man, bellowing into a mike with no audience in attendance. Respectfully, I climb off my bike, wheel it past the specimens. The cars are disappointing: gauded up fakes—Studebaker painted with flames; muscle car with gold carburetor cover. I'd rather look at the true antiques with the patina of their complicated lives intact.

At the end of the corridor, I hop back on and pedal hard, checking my newly-acquired rear view mirror before I bank right onto River Street. Coming toward me a mom and a little girl, biking with great determination and balance. I pull into a parking lot to let them pass, think about shouting out corny words of encouragement, but clearly neither the mom or the daughter need my support.

The garden is empty of people, but full of green and gold light. My plot neighbor has hoisted an American flag complete with eagle knob on top. This on the same pole that flaunts the twisted, hardened work glove that I decided was there to scare off crows. Could the flag with its silver eagle be there for the same purpose?

I love the way the garden looks mulched with straw—the plants look as though they're enjoying the ultimate luxury or comfort—fluffed straw surrounds them, frames them so that the greeny-blue leaves of the broccoli take on new beauty and the squash vines spread horizontally across the tangle of blonde straw. Everything looks happy—except for the peppers who seem determined not to grow—the stance of the anorexic—a sort of protest I haven't sorted out yet.

With my scissors, I cut a full-head of butter crunch, a bunch of basil, and five fragrant strands of Greek oregano. I deadhead the marigolds and cut two fancy marigolds, dense orange poufs of overlapping petals that remind me of zinnias.